Botanicals

Botanically driven distilleries can level up their R&D with hundreds of individual distillations and macerations. Here’s what to know, so you can decide whether such a library is a smart move for your distillery.

As master distiller at Bombay Sapphire, Anne Brock combines creative interest in botanicals with the scientific approach of an organic chemist, testing various ingredients and distillation methods while prizing consistency of flavor.

In all its myriad forms, tea can add exotic yet comforting character to liqueurs and bitters.

Distillers south of the border are tapping into a diverse palette of botanical flavors to create uniquely Mexican expressions.

Some smaller distilleries are tapping into a wide range of botanicals to create gins meant to evoke (and be enjoyed in) the cooler weather.

As the market for craft gin expands, distillers are opting for seasonal gin choices that often go hand in hand with a focus on connecting gin to a place—for example, by using local, hand-harvested botanicals. Here, we share some tips on harvesting, storing, and balancing botanicals.

In this excerpt from his video course about getting the most from your lab still, Jamie Burns of The Family Jones in Denver explains how to standardize botanical fractions so you can build recipes that scale.

You’re not hallucinating: Absinthe is enjoying some overdue growth among American drinkers. In the first of a two-part series, we consider its background and trajectory—and in the next, we’ll zoom in on the craft of making it.

Once you understand the basics of absinthe and broadly which path you intend to follow, it’s time to make some flavor decisions. Here we consider how you can put your own thumbprint on the spirit via botanicals and other creative choices.

In this first of a two-part series, Devon Trevathan lays out the basics of what it takes to make a successful liqueur—from choosing a spirit base to flavoring and filtration. The most important ingredient, however, may be trial and error.